ARTS >Istanbul’s first bus museum to be opened

TOFED president Mehmet Erdoğan says, Istanbul will get a new bus museum in Golden Horn district with the support of Istanbul Development Agency in the future.

A new project called “Bustanbul,” supported by the Turkish Bus Federation (TOFED), will carry tourists to Istanbul’s historic sites, including a planned bus museum, via buses dating from the 1930s.

When the Bustanbul project gets underway in 2014, its first stop will be the city’s new bus museum on the Golden Horn, which will house 24 historic and nostalgic buses. Bustanbul drivers will wear historically accurate uniforms, and educational films will be shown on the buses. The Bustanbul project is currently seeking support from the Istanbul Development Agency.

TOFED’s first priority is to establish an education and health association for bus drivers, but it will apply to the Culture Ministry for permission to open the bus museum on the Golden Horn, Mehmet Erdoğan, TOFED’s president said, speaking to Anatolia news agency. After the necessary permissions are granted, the museum’s sponsors will help the association establish the museum. As a result of the closing of the shipyards along the Golden Horn, many sites in the area will be free in the coming months, Erdoğan said, which is why TOFED is looking to build the museum there. Similar museums already exist in the U.S., the U.K. and Germany, Erdoğan said.

“The bus museum will exhibit buses from the 1930s to the present day. If we can find the necessary financial support we will exhibit all [models of the city’s historical] buses, year by year,” Erdoğan said. The first ever bus line in Istanbul started in 1864, and ran between Taksim and Sarıyer, he said. The museum will also include exhibits about the development of the Turkish bus industry.